NCJ Number
73791
Date Published
1978
Length
89 pages
Annotation
The organization of a special Dutch program offering assistance to suspects at the earliest arrest and detention stages is evaluated.
Abstract
In 1974 two new articles in the Dutch code of criminal procedures laid the groundwork for providing official early aid to crime suspects. Early assistance provides judicial authorities with thorough background information on suspected offenders, helps suspects in custody deal with serious problems, and when desirable, to initiate, the assistance process. The program is currently in the process of expanding within each district. The police now report cases for early assistance to the Probation Council by telephone rather than in writing, and weekend assistance services have been instituted. Study results show that the number of early assistance contacts is greater in districts where social workers can visit prisoners at the police station than in districts where social workers work with folders alone. Direct visits, telephone reports, and weekend services are essential to effective organization of early assistance. The attitude of the police is an essential factor in further expansion of the early assistance program, which will expand at the expense of other activities. Perhaps early help efforts should target particular groups, leaving aid for the remaining offenders to other programs. Further studies of early assistance will examine whether the practice reduces the number of suspected offenders in protective custody and whether it allows the information needed by the public prosecutor to be gathered in the short time available. Extensive appendixes list the people involved in the early assistance program, the groups participating, service forms, systems for reporting arrests, peculiarities of early assistance organization in particular districts, and the questionnaire used to gather statistics on early assistance. Notes and tables are supplied.